


as you are, it is enough

by SuperBlondie



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Creatures & Monsters, Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Chanyeol is a sweet boy, Dark!Yixing, Fluff, Jongdae is a sweet boy, M/M, Magic, Minor Character Death, Romance, Will-O-The-Wisp, Will-o-wisp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-06
Updated: 2019-10-06
Packaged: 2020-11-24 19:23:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,891
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20912834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuperBlondie/pseuds/SuperBlondie
Summary: In a forest full of darkness, on the shore of a lake full of bodies, sits a boy who stares at the lights above the lake and wishes he could float too.





	as you are, it is enough

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for Monster Fest prompt T147! 
> 
> I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!
> 
> As always, a big thank you to [Aarushi](https://twitter.com/Aarushi_c18), for being the best beta in the whole wide world <333

Chanyeol stares at the lights glowing, floating out above the lake. The lake that's so full of bodies that the local human police have to bring out a boat to dredge the bottom every few months. Not all of them are the fault of the lights above the lake; humans can be just as nasty as monsters when they feel like it and have a lake already full of bodies to dump their evidence in.

But a lot of them are unfortunate hikers, swimmers, people who just got lost in the woods and managed to make their way to the lake. To the lights. The lights that draw them in closer and closer like moths to flame, keep them swimming until they can't anymore and disappear under the water.

Chanyeol's watched it happen a few times. When Baekhyun was still around, he would make Chanyeol watch as he lured the humans to the edge of the lake so that one day he would do it on his own and finally prove himself worthy of floating. Sometimes he would use his pretty face and sweet voice to make them trust him, others he would call upon his powers to shake trees and create false shadows that drove the humans so mad with fear that they would go wherever he herded them.

Chanyeol thinks Baekhyun liked those ones the best. The other lights sure did.

The other lights sure don't like Chanyeol. He can hear them from where they're out on the lake, voice ringing around in his head no matter how much he wished they wouldn't. They talk about him like he isn't there and yet he knows they want him to hear every single word.

Barbed words about how he's been stumbling out in the forest for so long and never managed to bring a human to the lake. He must have been created wrong, something twisted in his head as he emerged from the moonlight and left him utterly useless.

Baekhyun said that he wasn't useless, said he had all the makings to do his job and do it well. He said Chanyeol was pretty, with his pink hair, over-sized ears, and sweet face. Said his human form was prettier than most of the other lights’. And Chanyeol knows how to get people to follow him, knows how to play up his cute face and big eyes to make humans want to help him get to wherever he needs to go, knows how to herd them along with shadows and unnatural sounds if they don't come willingly.

Chanyeol is not _useless_. He tells himself that as often as he can, and Baekhyun, the best of their kind, agreed. He's not useless, just directionless.

Directionless, unable to lead humans to the lake because, more often than not, he can barely find the lake himself.

He's had so many humans ready to follow him to their deaths, literally, but ended up leading them in circles because he couldn't remember which way he'd come from or which way he needed to go. They would walk for hours, the humans getting so caught up in Chanyeol's endless circles that they got lost themselves. The ones he had to push around with fear and illusions would run out of steam and collapse to the ground, escaping death by sheer lack of stamina.

Sometimes, another will-o-wisp would come down from the lake and take over, leading the humans to the lake, to their deaths, with ease. And that stung. Once Chanyeol had led a human nearly to the lake, was just about to figure out which way to turn at the moss-covered boulder that sat before the final copse of trees separating the lake from the rest of the forest. He had been _so close_ to earning his place above the water.

And then Yixing had appeared, looking so sweet and lost, helpless in the way Chanyeol knew he most certainly _wasn't_. And the human Chanyeol had been leading was so drawn to Yixing and his sad eyes that they couldn't help but go with him.

It was sweet, how the human had made Chanyeol promise to stay next to the boulder so that they would be able to come back and find him after they helped Yixing. It was really sweet, so sweet that Chanyeol almost told them to run away and never come back. He didn't though, just watched the human follow Yixing through the same trees Chanyeol would've taken them through.

They didn't come back and the voices in Chanyeol's head laughed at him for _days_.

More often than not, the human following Chanyeol would realize there was something not quite right about him and his pink hair, his too bright eyes, and run for their lives. They would run straight through his illusions, so scared of him that they didn't care what else was waiting for them out there in the forest.

Chanyeol isn't even upset about those ones, not really. He can respect their instincts even if it means that he spends more time sitting on the shore, staring out at the lights flickering like lanterns.

Chanyeol just needs to lure in one human to join the lights above the lake – _one _single body sinking down underneath the waves. It shouldn't be that hard considering how easily Baekhyun used to do it, how easily Yixing does it now.

But here Chanyeol is, a will-o-wisp of ten years and still stuck with his ass in the grass and water lapping at his toes.

Sometimes he thinks about doing what Baekhyun did, leaving all this behind for something else. S_omething greater _is what Baekhyun called it as he hauled himself and the human out of the lake that night, soaking wet and coughing out lake water in a way no will-o-wisp ever did. _I've found something so much greater than this, Chanyeol, and I intend to keep it_.

But no matter how much he thinks about it, he knows he won't because it would mean never getting to live above the lake. Chanyeol doesn't understand how anything can be greater than living out above the lake, floating with the others. _Belonging_.

Baekhyun belonged above the lake even before he found something else to belong to, but Chanyeol's never had anything. He belonged with Baekhyun, maybe, for a time, but not the way Baekhyun belonged above the lake or with the man he pulled out of the water that night. Chanyeol just wants that feeling in his chest, that _yes, here, this is where I’m supposed to be_. He thinks – _knows _he’ll find it above the lake.

He just has to earn a place there and the voices will stop. He’ll stop being useless and become normal, accepted.

~~*~~

Chanyeol has never quite understood how his feet always manage to lead him to lost humans. Most of his time is spent wandering aimlessly, so hopelessly lost that he forgets where he wanted to go in the first place, or sitting, rooted, on the shore of the lake. He has never gotten lost on the way to a human though.

He'll suddenly know that there's a human waiting for him somewhere in the forest, and his feet will guide him there. No one really knows how they know when a human is lost either. Chanyeol doesn't really care how or why he's able to find humans so easily, just wishes that he could find the lake the same way.

Chanyeol sighs and scuffs his feet as he watches his most recent attempt at gaining a spot above the lake take off at a dead sprint in the opposite direction. The man had introduced himself as Jackson when Chanyeol found him wandering in a circle around a patch of mushrooms. He'd said that he'd gotten lost while gathering up flowers to decorate for a party he's having the next morning and asked if Chanyeol knew which way home was.

Chanyeol said he did, said it would be easier if they went to Chanyeol's home first and worked from there. Jackson followed him further into the forest and he wondered if this was the one that wouldn't come back out.

It was daylight then, hot under the summer sun. They'd stopped a few times for Jackson to rest and drink from one of the many water bottles he kept in his backpack. Jackson offered one of them to Chanyeol each and every time they stopped, and each and every time Chanyeol refused.

He realizes now, as the man is running away with the moonlight as his only guide, that that was a mistake.

Chanyeol doesn't even bother sending out shadows after Jackson to try and herd him back in. The fear was radiating off him in waves once he finally realized Chanyeol had just been leading him around in circles, slowly approaching the lake in the middle of the forest. He'd called him a monster. An evil spirit that craved death, sent from the depths of hell to torture and kill.

It hurts more than it probably should. Chanyeol doesn't _crave_ death, it's just a part of him. Leading humans to doom is what he's meant to do. Calling him evil for it is like condemning a hawk for killing a mouse - hating something for its nature. Or at least he thinks so. He doesn't want to be evil.

He drops onto the ground, knees hugged to his chest. He rests his chin on his knees and stares out into the darkness. The empty, gentle darkness. Empty except for him and Jackson.

He wonders how far Jackson's gotten by now, if he's found a landmark to use as a guide back home. He wonders if there's someone waiting for him, sitting in a house with all the lights on worried and praying that every minute will be the one that brings Jackson home to them. And how beautiful that must be, to be loved so deeply. To belong.

The forest is quiet now that Jackson's run away and Chanyeol feels that much more lonely with silence.

He feels the soft grass under his feet, the wind blowing gently over his skin. It's getting cold now that the sun's gone down. He isn't human, but the cold blows through his thin shirt and sends goosebumps rising up all over his arms and legs all the same.

They remind him of Baekhyun that night. He'd crawled out of the lake with water sputtering out of his mouth and flopped onto the shore. Chanyeol had watched with wide eyes as the wind blew and Baekhyun started to shiver and shake, teeth chattering from the cold. The man that had crawled out next to him spit out even more water and started to tug off all his wet clothes.

Then he crawled further up the shore to the backpack he'd left there and dug out two sets of clothes. Chanyeol can still remember Baekhyun's smirk when he saw what the man was laying out on the ground. _Boy Scout, always so prepared._

He can still remember the look on Baekhyun's face when the man had forced him to sit up and started pulling off his wet clothes too, dressing him before he dressed himself. _You're not used to feeling the cold like this. Can't have you dying on me, not after all this. _It was shock, disbelief, and the sweetest kind of love.

Jackson's words ring around in Chanyeol's head, somehow drowning out the voices that call him useless and mock him for his latest failure. Monster, he'd called Chanyeol a monster. Chanyeol doesn't really know what monsters are to humans, only heard bits and pieces from the humans he's met during his time in the forest. He knows enough though, enough to know that monsters don't ever belong. Monsters don't deserve love.

And Baekhyun led so many humans to their deaths that Chanyeol knows the humans would consider him a monster. But Baekhyun loves and is loved, loved so much and so dearly that he choked on lake water and really, truly felt the cold.

Chanyeol doesn't want all that, just a place above the lake with the rest of their kind. He wants to deserve love, wants to find somewhere he fits just as himself.

He doesn't want to be a monster.

"I'm not a monster," Chanyeol says to the wind, to the darkness, to the moon, to no one but himself.

"Well that's good news for me then, huh?"

Chanyeol startles so hard he falls backward, head knocking against the ground as he rolls like beetle stuck on it’s back. Upside-down, he sees a man leaning against a tree a few steps away, smiling softly in the moonlight. Chanyeol doesn’t know how he managed to sneak up on him like this, why the forest never told him about another human lingering in the dark. Upside-down, Chanyeol stares at the man and feels incredibly stupid.

Finding humans was the one thing he’s good at. Seems like he’s useless at that now too.

He frowns and groans to himself, digs the heels of his palms into his eyes to try and drown out the dark, sad feelings popping up in his chest. He drops his hands back down to his sides, opens his eyes, and the man’s face is _right there_. He yelps in surprise, and the man laughs, “Yep, don’t look too much like a monster to me.”

Chanyeol sits up and twists around to look at the human. The strange human wandering around the forest at night and sneaking up on creatures like Chanyeol like it’s nothing. The human wandering around the forest at night, probably lost and in need of someone like Chanyeol to guide him. Even if he failed with Jackson, there’s a chance he could get this one right. He turns around to face the human with plans and ideas blooming like the forest in spring, hope that this might be _the one _making him jittery.

And then he actually gets a good look at the human’s face and can’t think of anything at all. The human is the prettiest human he’s ever seen. Prettiest _being _he’s ever seen, full stop, Baekhyun included. He’s so pretty with his cat-like smile and sparkling eyes that Chanyeol can feel his entire brain shutting down piece by piece.

He’s pretty sure that’s what he’s supposed to be doing to the human, not the other way around. The human should be the one shocked dumb, tongue sitting heavy and useless in his mouth. Chanyeol’s never been able to get that sort of reaction, always been more cute and innocent than breath-takingly gorgeous, but he’s seen it happen with Baekhyun a few times. He would appear out from behind a tree and the human would pause, pupils going wide as they took in the sight of him.

Those were always the easiest for Baekhyun to lure in. They’d follow him anywhere, into the arms of death itself if he asked. He never asked, never had to. Just brought them to the lake and watch the humans dive into the water and never come back out.

Chanyeol wonders what it says about the human – about _him _– that he’s the one feeling drawn in.

“Wh-what are you doing out in the forest at night,” he manages after a few moments. His mind comes back to him with each passing minute and he remembers his skills, his _purpose_. He’s going to lead this human to the lake. Even if he’s pretty, even if the way he said Chanyeol doesn’t look like a monster made him feel warm all over. “Are you lost?”

The man tilts his head this way and that. He looks Chanyeol up and down, eyes stopping at his face. He sees something there, he must to make his eyes light up the way they do, but Chanyeol has no idea what it is. One human had told him, a moment before she took off screaming into the night, that he had _death_ in his eyes. Empty, hollow death. He wonders if that’s what this human will see, if this human will run away and leave him all alone on the forest floor.

But then the human smiles with his teeth, “I could ask you those same questions. But, yeah, I guess I am.”

Chanyeol smiles and hopes he keeps it tame, nothing like the wild excitement starting to build in his chest. “I know the way out. I could help you, if you want.” There’s a few moments of silence, Chanyeol’s voice hanging in the air, and then more words jump out of his mouth before he can stop them, “I’m Chanyeol, by the way.”

He almost always tells the human he’s luring in his name at some point. It creates a layer of trust, makes him a little less of a stranger. It’s _normal_. It feels different right now though, feels shaky and nervous.

The human stands up and holds out a hand for Chanyeol to take. He helps Chanyeol to his feet and replies, “Jongdae.”

“Jongdae,” Chanyeol repeats, rolls the word in his mouth in a way he’s never done with any other human before. “Nice name.” And he means it. Jongdae’s smile gets brighter, eyes disappearing into happy little lines that the corners of Chanyeol’s mouth pull up too. They stand like that for a moment, hands clasped together between them, staring at each other through the darkness.

It reminds Chanyeol of lake water being coughed out onto the shore.

“You too. So, you know the way out of here?” Chanyeol nods. It’s a lie he’s told a thousand times, but this time it settles low in gut and pulls, twisting in on itself uncomfortably. If Jongdae notices the way he has to fight down a grimace, he doesn’t say anything, just pulls his hand out of Chanyeol’s and waves, “Then lead the way.”

And Chanyeol does. He tries to remember which way Jackson had ran off and goes directly opposite, hoping that the human had a better sense of direction than him and went the correct way out of the forest. Jongdae follows along at his side, whistling to himself under his breath and watching the darkness with bright eyes.

Twigs snap under their feet. Chanyeol’s feet, Jongdae’s shoes. Chanyeol wonders why Jongdae hasn’t commented on his bare feet yet. Most humans at least say _something_, but Jongdae doesn’t seem to care at all, happily lost in his own head.

The moonlight comes and goes as they pass through the trees, clouds and canopy hiding it away and leaving them in utter darkness. Jongdae’s whistles die down as time passes and they walk without end. Directionless. Chanyeol searches for landmarks he remembers, but all the trees look the same to him. Eventually, he gives up and resigns himself to just walking. The silence between them is unnerving then, the calm before one of those storms that shake the forest to its core, rip off tree limbs, uproot trunks older than the oldest will-o-wisp.

Chanyeol doesn’t like it.

He doesn’t think Jongdae does either. “Any special reason you were curled up in a ball on the forest floor talking about monsters? Or is that just a normal Friday night for you?” He says it with a playful smile that shines in the dark.

Chanyeol sputters. He’s not sure if it’s because of the question or the smile. “I-I – well, I… Friday?”

He’s heard of Friday before, from humans, from Baekhyun. Chanyeol lives through the days without end, without label. There is no marking of time besides the sun, the moon, and the stars. Seasons too, if he thinks about larger chunks of time, but he doesn’t have _days_ like the humans do. Baekhyun said they have calendars where they mark of days into weeks into months into years.

Baekhyun had one for a while, before that night. It’s almost completely decomposed in the lake now, but Chanyeol saved a page of it for himself before Yixing tossed it into the lake. He doesn’t know why, maybe to remember Baekhyun by, maybe just because he liked the way the little black dog on the glossy paper looked. But he ripped out a page with the word _November_ stretched in pretty red letters across the top and he keeps it folded up in the hole of a tree too small for any animal to live in.

“Yeah, Friday. What, are existential crises a Saturday night event?”

Chanyeol doesn’t know what any of that means, but he likes how Jongdae’s voice sounds when he says it. So, he shrugs and bites down a smile. “Just had a bad day. Someone said some, uh, not nice things to me.”

Jongdae frowns. They’re standing under a break in the canopy, bathing in the moonlight. Chanyeol can see every line and angle of Jongdae’s face and doesn’t even stop to wonder when they stopped walking in the first place. “Monster? They called you a monster?” Chanyeol nods and Jongdae’s frown deepens. “Seems like bullshit to me. You don’t look like you could hurt a fly.”

And Chanyeol doesn’t know how he’s supposed to feel about that, how he _does _feel about that.

It makes him feel warm inside again, at first, heart skipping in his chest with eager excitement. He doesn’t _want _to be a monster. He doesn’t know why anyone _would _want to be a monster, something evil and nasty, hurting people for no other reason than because they want to. Chanyeol doesn’t do that. He has never hurt anyone – yet.

He’s supposed to though. He’s supposed to lead humans like Jackson, like Jongdae, to their deaths in the lake water. He’s supposed to make people drown; drowning hurts, Baekhyun said so as he shivered on the lake shore, coughing even when his lungs had no more water left to give. He said drowning hurts and he didn’t even drown all the way. The man helping Baekhyun dress said it would hurt for at least another day, a deep, aching, burning pain in his lungs. Chanyeol is supposed to do that to people. Except they won’t come back out to spew water and spend a few days with a sore chest. He’s supposed to bring people to the lake so that when they go under, they stay under.

Chanyeol doesn’t want to be a monster, but that’s what he’s supposed to be.

“He had his reasons,” Chanyeol says with a shrug. And those reasons were painfully true. He swallows down that pain, the bitterness that Jackson was probably right. Chanyeol is a monster, he has to be if he wants to float above the lake. He does, he wants to _so badly_.

Jongdae narrows his eyes. He stares at Chanyeol like he knows there’s something Chanyeol isn’t telling him, but he doesn’t pry. He just narrows his eyes for a moment, twists his mouth into very irritated frown, and starts walking again.

Chanyeol follows after him and they fall in step, wandering through the trees. Birds chatter above them. It breaks the silence but not the tension. The tension Chanyeol can never remember feeling before. He doesn’t like it, how it grates against his skin and makes the air feel heavy around them. “Why,” he starts, pauses, looks out of the corner of his eye to see if Jongdae even wants to talk.

Chanyeol doesn’t ever remember feeling this way before. He thinks he kind of likes it.

Jongdae turns to him and makes a soft noise. He’s not smiling, but he’s not frowning either. “Why what?”

“Why are you out here tonight?” Jongdae’s not a hiker, not with the way he’s dressed in a long-sleeved shirt, jeans, and shoes Baekhyun called sneakers. He doesn’t look like a hiker or a swimmer or a man gathering flowers for a party. He doesn’t look like he belongs here, in the forest, following Chanyeol towards the general direction of doom.

Chanyeol doesn’t know why he cares, why he asks. He’s never asked before.

Jongdae reaches out and brushes his fingers over a passing tree trunk. A bit of it comes off on his hands and he just smiles and brushes it off onto his pants. “Used to live in town when I was a kid, spent like half of my childhood in the little part of the woods near my house. I moved away for college. But my best friend stayed around and is getting married in a few weeks, so I flew in for his wedding. Thought I’d come visit the forest for a little while, see if it still has the same magic it did when I was a kid.”

Chanyeol smiles at the softness on Jongdae’s face, the way he seems so at home in a forest full of dangerous creatures. There are two towns that border the forest, one on each end with the forest in the middle. Chanyeol’s heard from a few of the other will-o-wisps that most of the humans they meet come from the western town. He wonders which one Jongdae’s from to be so at ease.

“Does it,” Chanyeol asks.

Jongdae turns and meets Chanyeol’s eyes, bright as they catch the moonlight. Jongdae smiles. “Yeah,” he says after a moment, “I think it does.”

Chanyeol's face turns hot and he turns away, towards the trees and the darkness. Anything to get away from the way Jongdae's looking at him. Jongdae chuckles to the empty air, breeze whispering through the trees and taking the sound with it. Chanyeol still hears it though, feels it ruffle his hair and turn his face that much more red.

It's a long time before Chanyeol has the courage to look at Jongdae again. This is Chanyeol's territory; the magic Jongdae feels is running through Chanyeol's veins. And yet, he feels so small, feels like Jongdae could string him along with just a word or a smile.

The hunter trailing after the deer. Or the deer thought he was the hunter all this time and is trailing after a mountain lion because he believes he's in control.

They walk, and walk, and continue walking. Jongdae follows for far longer than any other human has without saying _something_, asking if Chanyeol is sure he knows where they're going, asking for a break. Jongdae just walks. He stays at Chanyeol's side, hums as they pass through the grass, weave between the trees.

When Chanyeol gathers the nerve to chance a glance at him, to see if he's starting to catch on to the fact that Chanyeol has no idea where they're going, the man is smiling like he can't imagine being anywhere else. Like he's just enjoying Chanyeol's company.

Chanyeol can't remember the last time anyone's ever felt like that - aside from Baekhyun.

He decides then that he won't mind if this one gets away. The voices are already loud inside his head. They call him names, mock the way he wanders, the way he and Jongdae fall into step. Will-o-wisps are meant to _lead_. But Chanyeol doesn't want to lead, he wants to walk with Jongdae just like this. Wander the night away with some of the best company he's had in a long time.

And they do. They wander in peaceful, companionable silence. Chanyeol watches the fireflies dance with a contentment he hasn't felt since Baekhyun plunged beneath the waves.

The owls hoot, the foxes bark, the raccoons chitter, the cicadas sing, and Chanyeol thinks this is the nicest night he's ever had.

So nice, that when they step out from a copse of trees and into a field, grass stretching down a hill to a little gravel spot lit with tall, metal poles - streetlamps, Chanyeol's heard humans look through the trees and say they're looking for the light of streetlamps - he doesn't think anything of it.

When his feet force him to stop at the very edge of the farthest reaching tree root, Jongdae walking out ahead, his whole body jerks to try and follow. "Jongdae," he calls, looking down at his feet to see what plant they've gotten tangled up in this time. There's no plant though, just plain grass and a barrier sparking up at the edge of the tree root that tells him he's gone as far as the magic will allow.

That he's been strung along like an idiot, following after Jongdae without a single thought as to where they're going.

Chanyeol doesn't know what to do but stare in disbelief that he'd been the one led. Not to doom or death, but to the exact opposite of where he was supposed to go. And he hadn't even noticed.

Jongdae turns around to face him with a sad little smile. He takes a few steps forward, stopping just beyond the tree root. "You didn't think I was just going to let you lead me to the lake, did you?"

"Yo-you knew," Chanyeol breathes. "You knew the whole time, didn't you?" Jongdae nods. Chanyeol wonders if the awful twisting in his stomach, the anger on the back of his tongue, at Jongdae for tricking him, at himself for falling for it, is how all the humans he'd tried to lead felt.

"Your hair, your face. No one is _that _pretty, not unless there's a catch." Jongdae grins, half his mouth ticking up in a smile that seems hopeful and playful and other happy things Chanyeol doesn't want to see.

"Then why? Why did you even talk to me if you knew what I was?"

Jongdae shrugs, toe of his shoe scuffing against the ground. "I didn't want to die, but you seemed so sad that I didn't want to leave you there either. I figured I'd cheer you up and then take off. Your illusions don't scare me. But then I realized you didn't even know how to get to the lake and - you're sweet, Chanyeol, can't blame me for wanting to spend a little more time with you.

"So you led me to the edge of the forest to what? Make me look like an idiot," Chanyeol asks. He bites down on his tongue to try and push back the ugly feelings creeping up his spine. He's so _stupid_.

Jongdae's eyes go wide and he shakes his head, hands coming up in placation. "No," he says, "No! I just didn't know how to break it to you, you know? You were just so sad when I first saw you, calling yourself a monster. And I meant what I said earlier, you're not a monster. I didn't want to make you sad again."

Chanyeol scoffs, a puff of air that makes Jongdae wince. "Just go. You don't have to lie to me or come up with some excuse. You just wanted to drag me around, make fun of the _stupid_ will-o-wisp that can't lead a single fucking human to the lake," Chanyeol's voice breaks and he scrunches up his nose, putting his hands over his ears like it'll make the voices stop.

But they don't stop. They mock him. Words about how useless he is, how humans are better at getting around the forest than he is. How he should throw himself in the lake now, cross the barrier and never come back so that there's more room for will-o-wisps that can actually do their jobs.

Tears well up and fall, one after the other, running down his cheeks and dripping off his chin. They burn his eyes as the words burn his ears and he wants everything to _stop_.

Chanyeol turns on his heel, charging back into the forest where he can curl up underneath a tree and hide until pain stops.

"Chanyeol," Jongdae calls, voice loud and piercing through the trees.

And Chanyeol stops, because he's been so stupid tonight that one more mistake can't cost him that much. He doesn't turn because he doesn't want to see the look of pity he knows will be on Jongdae's face. Or maybe disgust. There's really no telling what humans will do.

"I really do like you, Chanyeol. I didn't mean to make you so upset." There's a pause, a deep breath, and then, "I'll be right here tomorrow night, on my side of the barrier. I'd like it if you came and talked to me."

Chanyeol laughs bitterly. He can barely find his way to the lake, the place his very existence is tied to; he'll never get back to the edge of the forest on his own. Not that he'd ever come back in the first place.

Chanyeol walks further into the forest with vicious, mocking voices in his ears, and promises himself that he'll never see Jongdae again.

~~*~~

The voices stop around noon the next day, sun shining down through the trees. He wonders how it looks reflecting off the lake, if the other will-o-wisps will come down to enjoy its warmth. He doesn't think they will. They love floating too much.

Baekhyun said that floating is like sitting in a void. There's no sun, no moon, no sound of lake water lapping against the shore. There's nothing to feel, nothing to do aside from watching out over the will-o-wisps on the ground. It's just _existing _with no end in sight. There is no life, just the void and the passage of time.

Chanyeol digs is bare toes into the dirt. It's cool against his skin, as it squishes between his toes. The air around him is warm despite the breeze. Songbirds flit from tree to tree, crooning to their babies in their nests. He recognizes some of the birds. A crow he fed a worm to years ago that will occasionally perch on a nearby branch, a pair of strikingly red cardinals that spend all their days together.

The forest changes with time. It grows and shifts, gathers new creatures as the old lie down to rest. It is _alive_.

Yixing came down from the lake once and said that it looked just the same as it did the last time he saw it. Chanyeol didn't know how to prove him wrong, to show him how summer storms had knocked down old tree limbs, the bees had tracked pollen and seeds to an open clearing and created the beginnings of a new field of flowers. Yixing wouldn't have cared either. And Chanyeol doesn't blame him. Their kind aren't meant to care about the forest and the creatures in it like he does, aren't meant to stay on the ground and watch life find a way time and time again.

Baekhyun came down to visit enough to see some of the changes, but even he didn't care about them until the very end. It's always only been Chanyeol in the grass, staring up at the birds, listening to the wind and the bees.

When he finally floats above the lake, he thinks that this will be what he misses the most. He wonders if he'll become like the others, happy to sit in the void and exist. Happy without life. He hopes not.

~~*~~

Night comes and Chanyeol walks alone. He doesn't know why he walks without a human to lead, but he does. He follows the tracks of deer, of rabbits, of shoes smaller than his own feet. They're not Jongdae's, but walking alongside them make him feel less alone all the same.

Chanyeol squeezes his eyes shut and tries to pretend that Jongdae doesn't exist. He pushes the previous night out of his mind, out of his memories, out of his thoughts that won't stop circling back to how nice it felt to have someone to walk next to.

How nice it felt to walk next to Jongdae. Jongdae, the strange human who tricked Chanyeol, who said he wasn't a monster, said that he'd be waiting at the edge of the forest if Chanyeol wanted to come see him again.

Chanyeol doesn't want to see him, doesn't even know how to get back to the edge of the forest if he did.

So, Chanyeol walks. He wanders through the forest, lets his feet take him wherever they want to go. The trees all look the same at night, branches reaching up towards the sky, leaves blocking out the light of the moon. Chanyeol loses the shoe prints in the dark and tells himself that it's for the best. He can't follow after a human - not again.

He comes to a patch of moonlight shining through a break in the trees. Through the gaps in the leaves, he can see the stars glinting and shining in the sky above. They remind him of Jongdae's eyes.

They remind him of the way Jongdae looked at him when he said that the forest still had magic. The way it made him feel. No one's ever made him feel like that before, special, precious, _enough_.

He wants to feel it again.

Chanyeol continues his walk through the forest with nothing to keep him company but the moon and the wind, and he tries to feel nothing at all.

"Chanyeol!" Chanyeol pauses, stares out into the dark. He refuses to turn his head towards the sound. "Chanyeol!" Chanyeol shuffles in place, Jongdae's voice wrapping around his wrist like a hand and tugging. It urges him to listen, to let the voice guide him back to the edge of the forest.

He knows he should ignore it. He should turn and run in the opposite direction. He should push the voice out of his head, block his ears, and keep walking like he never heard it in the first place.

"Chanyeol, I'm waiting for you! Just like I promised."

He follows the sound of Jongdae's voice instead, and it's the first time he's ever felt like he knew where he was going.

Chanyeol sees Jongdae before Jongdae sees him, peering out from the shadows of the trees to where the human is standing just beyond the barrier that sparks on the ground. He's got his hands on his hips and his eyes narrowed into slits.

Jongdae's just as handsome as he was the night before. He looks softer tonight though, messy hair and soft clothes. Soft smile when Chanyeol shuffles out from his hiding place in the shadows and stops at the edge of the barrier.

“You came,” he says. Chanyeol nods. “Didn’t think you would, if I’m honest.”

“Didn’t think I would either.”

Jongdae grins. “Just couldn’t resist the sound of my voice, huh?” Chanyeol snorts and kicks at the ground. He twists his fingers into the hem of his shirt even as Jongdae is chuckling and dismissing his own joke with a wave of his hand. “Just messing with you. I’m glad you came though. A little worried I’d really pissed you off.”

The relief obvious in the way he grins, the way he shoves his hands into his pockets and lets his shoulders roll back. Chanyeol can see it written across Jongdae’s face, he just doesn’t understand _why._ No one has ever cared about pissing him off before. Not the humans, not the other will-o-wisps – Baekhyun did after he met the human he dragged out of the lake that night, but not before.

Chanyeol wants to ask, wants to know why Jongdae is here, why he even bothered to apologize in the first place. But he doesn’t, because if he questions him, Jongdae might get upset and leave and Chanyeol doesn’t want that even more than he wants to know what’s going on in Jongdae’s head.

So he just shrugs. “Well, I’m here.”

“That you are. Want to sit down? Get comfortable?” Jongdae digs into the pack sitting at his feet and pulls out a roll of red and white fabric that he then tosses across the barrier. It lands with a _thump _at Chanyeol’s feet, unrolling on its own into a pretty blanket. “I brought one for each of us. Can’t really share one with the barrier, you know.”

That’s not true. Baekhyun used to. Chanyeol would watch him through the trees, confused and upset, as he sat with his back pressed up against the barrier like a wall and talked, picking at the tassels hanging off the blanket underneath him. The same blanket that stretched across the barrier to give the man with glasses and a deep voice a place to rest. It’s possible to share a blanket, but Chanyeol doesn’t want to.

Instead, he pulls the blanket farther onto his side and spreads it out nice and flat before he lies down with a sigh. He’s not supposed to feel discomfort; he’s supposed to be able to sleep on dirt, rock, and grass without complaint, and he can. He _can. _He may be incompetent at every other task a will-o-wisp is supposed to do or lack every other trait a will-o-wisp is supposed to have, but he’s normal in this sense.

He’s not _completely _useless. Even if Jongdae and the voices that are picking up again make him feel like he is.

Jongdae stares at him as he drops down to sit on his own identical blanket. Chanyeol stares right back, lets the hurt and shame from the night before grab the corners of his mouth and weigh them down.

“I’m sorry that I hurt you.” Jongdae’s grin fades as he stares at Chanyeol. He props his elbows up on his knees, his chin on a fist. “You understand why I had to though, right? I’d heard stories about beautiful people appearing out of thin air to ‘help’ lost hikers, the lake full of bodies that no one can account for. I go walking out in the forest and see you, the most attractive person I’ve _ever _met. And then you start asking if I’m lost. Didn’t really make me want to tell you the truth.”

“You think I’m the most attractive person you’ve ever met,” Chanyeol’s mouth moves before he can stop it, the rest of Jongdae’s words disappearing into the night air as he latches onto that little bit.

Jongdae chuckles. He shakes his head, scrubs over his face with his hands. “That’s what you hear? But yeah, yeah, I do. How could I not?” Chanyeol’s cheeks feel hot as Jongdae runs his eyes over what he can see of his body; he rubs his face against the blanket like it might force the blush away.

“I do too,” he stammers, “Think you’re pretty, that is. I think you’re pretty too.”

Jongdae smiles like a sunrise. It warms Chanyeol from the inside out in a way he doesn’t really want to think about.

Silence stretches on between them, just the crickets and the cicadas’ music to fill the empty air. The clouds that were blanketing the sky have all but disappeared over the horizon now, setting the moon free to bathe the forest in her light. It reflects off Jongdae’s skin, catches on his hair, and for a moment Chanyeol wonders which one of them is made of magic and moonlight, created from the forest itself.

Jongdae seems happy to sit like this, leaning back on his hands and turning his face upwards towards the moon and the stars. Chanyeol fidgets in place. His feet kick and twist in the fabric of the blanket, fingers picking at blades of grass.

Curious, nervous, needing something to do with his hands before the million thoughts in his head tumble out of his mouth, Chanyeol reaches out a hand towards the barrier. It lights up blue. A wall that shoots out of the ground to meet his fingertips. It’s solid, doesn’t budge when he presses hard with one palm.

He’s known about the barrier since his creation, but it’s the first time it’s ever held him in. It’s the first time Chanyeol realizes that he’s trapped. He wonders how it feels for Jongdae to enter and exit the forest at will, how it felt for Baekhyun to stumble across the barrier that night and realize he was completely, utterly _free_.

“Nothing magic can cross the barrier,” Jongdae’s voice startles Chanyeol out of his thoughts. “Keeps the humans safe from some of the more unsavory creatures that live in the forest. Also keeps you stuck in there.” Chanyeol nods.

Jongdae scoots closer, until the toes of his sneakers are nearly touching the barrier. “Have you ever wanted to cross?”

Chanyeol shakes his head and then pauses, shrugs. “Never really thought about it before.” And now that he’s really taken a look at the world outside of the forest, even just the little sliver of it he can see from his spot at the edge of the barrier, he doesn’t want to think about it.

Instead, he huffs out a breath and blows his bangs out of his eyes. He watches the way the hair falls back down in the exact same place instead of looking at Jongdae as he asks, “Why did you come back? Why did you apologize in the first place?”

Jongdae stiffens. For a moment, Chanyeol thinks he’s going to stand up and leave. And then he relaxes, cheeks turning pink in the moonlight as he gives a grin that seems a little embarrassed. “I enjoyed your company. I liked you from the start, and once I realized you weren’t dangerous, I liked you even more. Just want to get to know you better.”

“That’s dumb,” Chanyeol scoffs.

One of Jongdae’s eyebrows ticks up. “Why’s that?”

“Because I _am _dangerous.” Jongdae throws his head back and laughs and Chanyeol pushes himself up onto his elbows, face burning. “I am! You’ve heard the stories about the lake, you know what I am.”

The lake, placid and undisturbed because Chanyeol is here talking to Jongdae and not roaming the forest to find other humans. Not that he’d be able to lead them to the lake even if he did find them because he’s _useless_.

Because, “I bet none of the bodies in the lake are there because of you.”

Chanyeol sucks in a breath and turns his head to the side. He sucks his lower lip into his mouth and bites down, hopes the pain will stop the tears that are welling up. Even Jongdae knows how useless he is, and he’s only known him for a _day_. It hurts when the voices tell him how stupid he is, how useless and defective and_ wrong_. Coming from Jongdae, a _human_, it flays him open – all his weaknesses pouring out for the world to see.

“Hey,” comes Jongdae’s voice, soft and soothing, “Hey, Chanyeol? What’s wrong? Don’t cry! Th-the thing with the lake, none of the bodies being your fault, that’s a good thing. That’s _great_, Chanyeol!” Chanyeol just shakes his head and curls up on the blanket, staring resolutely out into the dark, away from Jongdae.

“Yes, it is! You haven’t killed anyone! That’s good!”

“But I’m _supposed _to,” Chanyeol whimpers, “Will-o-wisps have one job, and I can’t do it. I just needed to do it once, just lead one human to the lake, and then I would get to float.”

The secrets pour out of him. Things no human is ever supposed to know, he lays them at Jongdae’s feet and cries into the red-and-white checkered blanket like an idiot. He doesn’t understand how Jongdae is able to draw these feelings out of him. He’d buried them down deep after Baekhyun left so that the others would never hear them in his head. They didn’t need anything else to mock him for. But Jongdae drags them all back up, makes him want to crawl across the ground and soak up the comfort the man is offering.

Instead, a hand settles in Chanyeol’s hair on its own, scratching gently against his scalp. “For what it’s worth,” Jongdae whispers, the rest of him still on his own side of the barrier, “I’m glad you haven’t – that you’re not, um, floating.”

“Why?”

“Because… Because then I wouldn’t be able to talk to you like this.” Chanyeol lets out a watery laugh and wipes at his tears. He pushes himself to sit up. Jongdae’s hand falls away and the human scoots back, body safe on the other side of the barrier. “I like talking to you.”

Chanyeol just stares at the human for a moment, searching for some sign that this is all an elaborate set-up for another trick. He doesn’t find any, only soft sincerity. “You’re so weird.”

Jongdae laughs, “How am I weird? You’re the one with pink hair and magic powers.” Dark hair falls in his eyes and he lets it hang there, meeting Chanyeol’s gaze through the curtain.

“You’re…you’re so _nice_ to me. That’s weird.” No one’s been this nice to him, not since Baekhyun.

Jongdae’s smile falls and Chanyeol winces, internally berating himself for killing the mood. He chews on the inside of his cheek, runs his fingers through the grass. Across from him, Jongdae is stone-still. His gaze slips off to the side, somewhere to Chanyeol’s left, and stays there for a few long moments. “Well,” he sighs after he finally drags his eyes back to Chanyeol, “I guess I’ll have to keep coming back, so you have to get used to me being nice to you. Then you won’t think it’s so weird anymore.”

Chanyeol doesn’t think that’ll happen. Jongdae won’t stick around long enough to make it happen, probably won’t ever see him again after tonight. “Maybe,” Chanyeol shrugs, “we’ll see.”

The moonlight catches on Jongdae’s cheekbones as he tilts his head to the side. Chanyeol traces the lines of his face with his eyes. When Jongdae smiles, one side of his mouth pulling up, lips curling, Chanyeol finds himself smiling too. “Yeah, we’ll see.”

They sit in the soft, gentle quiet of the night for hours. Sometimes they talk, sometimes they just lie on the red and white blankets and stare up at the stars as they glitter in the inky black sky. It’s in one of those moments, Jongdae snoring softly on the other side of the barrier because he refused to leave despite his constant yawning, that Chanyeol realizes that he hasn’t heard the voices once that night. Not even the low, easily ignored hum that’s usually in the back of his mind.

No mocking voices, no thoughts about his own failures or his future. Just the wind in the trees and the sound of Jongdae’s breaths. His mind is quiet, and he’s content.

~~*~~

Jongdae comes back every night, just like he promised. Chanyeol didn’t expect him to. They said goodbye the first night and he was prepared for it to be the last time he ever saw the strange human again. But every night, Chanyeol follows the sound of Jongdae’s voice to the edge of the forest. A red and white blanket waiting for him, sometimes with extras like the things Jongdae calls “comic books”.

“Your pop culture knowledge is sorely lacking,” Jongdae explains as he shows Chanyeol which way the book opens, which way to read the words. “And that’s saying something, because my best friend is a hermit who wouldn’t know a single thing about pop culture if his fiancé wasn’t there to educate him. But, thankfully, he has his fiancé and you have me.”

Chanyeol likes the pictures, the bright colors and the action, but the letters make his head swim. He can read some, but not much, and not quickly. So all he does is curl in close to the lantern Jongdae had set up in the middle of the barrier and trace out the lines of each letter and each drawing.

“How do you like it so far?”

Chanyeol looks up from the red and gold thing he’d been tracing and smiles. “I like it. It’s pretty.”

Jongdae smiles in return. “Do you like Iron Man?”

“Which one is Iron Man?” Humans have always used such strange names.

“It lists them on the front page,” Jongdae says. “I told you to check it out before you started reading, remember?”

Chanyeol nods and puts his head back down, heat rushing to his cheeks in embarrassment. “I did, and I liked all the pictures, but…”

He flips to the front page and stares at the mess of letters, trying to put them together into sounds and words and sentences. The moonlight that created him blessed him with the ability to speak, not read. Baekhyun was the one who tried to teach him that, but they’d only had time for a lesson or two before that night came and his friend disappeared.

There’s a gasp and Chanyeol looks up to see Jongdae staring at him with big, sympathetic eyes. “You can’t read, can you?” And Chanyeol just shakes his head, because honesty comes too easy with Jongdae.

After the confession, any comic books Jongdae brings are shared between them, laid flat on Chanyeol’s side of the barrier as Jongdae teaches him which symbols make which sounds and how to read them in the big, strange letters of the comic book.

Jongdae calls him a fast learner when he reads an entire page on his own, voice stammering and stumbling as he works through the sounds. It’s the best compliment Chanyeol thinks he’s ever received.

A fast learner, smart, funny, sweet, silly, goofy – Jongdae gives him compliments he didn’t know he could earn. Jongdae makes Chanyeol feel things he didn’t know he could feel. Things will-o-wisps aren’t _supposed _to feel. Jongdae’s smile makes Chanyeol smile, his laugh makes Chanyeol laugh, and when he’s a little run down, a little sad, Chanyeol feels sad too.

When Jongdae is sad, all Chanyeol wants to do is make him happy again.

One night, after he’d spent the day leading a human in circles around the forest, searching for the lake he’s pretty sure he’ll never be able to find on his own, he curls up on his blanket with the last echoes of the mocking voices in his ears and stares up at the stars in miserable silence. And Jongdae asks, “Rough day?”

Chanyeol nods. Jongdae makes a little hum and reaches over the barrier to pat the top of Chanyeol’s head, not nearly as cautious with the barrier as he used to be. “Sorry to hear that. Anything I can do to make it up to you?”

“Why would you want to make it up to me? Not your fault.” He rolls over onto his belly to look the human in the eye.

“Doesn’t matter if it’s my fault or not, I still want to make your day better.”

Chanyeol’s not sure he’ll ever understand some of the things Jongdae does, how he cares for Chanyeol so much. How he makes _Chanyeol _care for him. Chanyeol has cared for people before. He cared for Baekhyun as much any will-o-wisp was supposed to be able to care for anyone. But Jongdae makes him go beyond that, makes him want to care the way humans care – selfless, devoted, all-consuming.

Jongdae grins. It’s just as pretty as it always is, but now it’s _more_. Jongdae is more than just a pretty human, he’s important, he’s kind, he’s every compliment that he’s ever given to Chanyeol and _more_.

“It took me some digging, but I managed to find my old portable DVD player at my parent’s house,” Jongdae pulls a bulky object out of his bag, “I’d hoped that I’d bring it on a good day, so that you’d get to really enjoy it. But I think it’ll be even better to watch it cheer you up.”

He sets the object on the ground and starts pressing buttons. Chanyeol’s not sure what a “DVD” is or why it needs to be played, but he wiggles to the edge of the barrier in muted excitement anyway.

Suddenly, it lights up and Chanyeol startles, jerking backwards as colors flash. Jongdae laughs, loud and outrageous at the squeak Chanyeol lets out when the thing starts making noise. “It’s okay! It’s okay, Yeollie! It’s just booting up and getting to the main menu. It’s just a movie.”

“A movie,” Chanyeol whispers. He’s heard of those before, moving pictures. “You brought me a movie?”

Jongdae nods and points to the part of the object that’s lit up. “Not just _any _movie. Check out the screen and tell me what it says.”

Chanyeol squints at the colors and lights, trying to make out shapes on the “screen.” Slowly, the colors and lights merge into squiggles, which focus into letters, and he sounds them out as they come into view. “I…Iron….Mmman. Iron Man. Iron Man? Iron Man! It’s an Iron Man movie?”

“Good job sounding the words out! And yep! You seemed to like him the most out of all the superheroes I’ve shown you, so I borrowed the DVD from Kyungsoo, and I thought we could watch it together. Thought it would be cool to show you your first movie.” Jongdae hits one of the buttons and the letter disappear, switching to new screens and colors. “Want to watch it?”

“Yeah!” Chanyeol nods so vigorously he smacks his head against the ground. Jongdae laughs, but he shifts the DVD player around so that they can both see it easily and lies down on his own blanket.

The movie plays, and Chanyeol knows he should be paying attention to the human talking on the screen, but he can’t look away from Jongdae. The strange human who cares enough about him to show him a movie, to think about what movie he might like the best.

“I wish I was like you,” Chanyeol says over the sound of the movie. “I wish…wish I could be just like you.”

And Jongdae looks away from the movie to meet Chanyeol’s eyes, colors flashing over his skin. He smiles with a tilt of his head, eyes warm. “I don’t. I don’t want you to ever be anyone but yourself. The you you are now is perfect just as it is.”

~~*~~

“Jongdae, are your friends married now?”

“What?” Jongdae freezes where he’s folding his blanket.

“Your friends. You said that you were here for their wedding. Are they married now?”

Chanyeol doesn’t understand the passage of time the way Jongdae does. Jongdae has weeks and months and years, but Chanyeol really only has days and seasons. Anything between those two is nearly impossible for him to track. But even he knows that weeks aren’t long, and that Jongdae has been coming to the forest every night for a long time, probably longer than he said he’d be staying when they met.

Jongdae grins, “You remembered!”

Chanyeol nods. He pulls his knees to his chest and buries his face in them to hide the heat rising to his cheeks. He keeps his eyes out though, watches Jongdae finish putting the comic books and folded up blankets into his bag.

“Yeah, they got married a week or two ago. They come back from their honeymoon next Sunday, I think. Thank God, I was getting tired of watching their dogs,” Jongdae says as he rolls his shoulders. They crack and Chanyeol hisses at the sound. Jongdae says it doesn’t hurt, that it feels nice, but it sounds like bones breaking apart. Chanyeol doesn’t like that sound when it’s associated with Jongdae. “I love dogs, you know? But I think three is a bit much, two poodles and a corgi, it’s a fucking _nightmare_.”

Then Jongdae pauses, arms held out as he demonstrates what it’s like to have to chase three little dogs around a house, trying to put leashes on them to go for a walk. “Why do you ask, though? You never ask about my life.”

“Sorry,” Chanyeol winces. He wonders if Jongdae thinks that he doesn’t care because he never asks about his life. Because he _does_, he does care, just doesn’t know what humans constitute as caring.

Jongdae frowns and his eyebrows pull together. “Don’t apologize. You never ask about my life because I never bring it up. You probably wouldn’t understand half the things I talk about if I did. And that’s okay, I don’t mind. I like not talking about other people when I’m with you, makes it feel like this time is just for us.”

Jongdae is so, so strange. But Chanyeol likes it. He picks his head to rest his chin on his knees, meeting Jongdae’s smile with one of his own. The words stay locked inside his chest, but he likes it too. Having their time together be just about them, he likes it too.

“I just asked because you’ve been here for a long time. I thought you were only going to stay for a few weeks,” Chanyeol explains after a moment of warm, peaceful silence. “I don’t know time like you, but I can understand when a lot of it has passed. I was wondering if you were going to have to go back to wherever you live soon.”

Jongdae makes a soft sound of understanding and nods slowly. “It was kind of a spur of the moment decision, and I’m still working out all the details, but I’ve decided to move into my parent’s house. My father passed a long time ago, and my mother’s sister lives in China with my cousin and his husband. Her sister is getting sick, so she’s going to move in with them until she either gets better or passes away as well, and I said I’d look after the house for her. And then a job opened up at the local middle school for an English teacher and – I just decided to stay.

“I was getting tired of the city anyway, too crowded and noisy. My hometown has gotten a lot more modern than it used to be, and all my closest friends stayed around here.” Jongdae pauses and smirks, head tilting to the side as his eyes flash with something Chanyeol doesn’t understand. “And then there’s you.”

“Me?” Chanyeol’s voice pitches up in excitement, fingers curling in the fabric of his shorts. “You stayed for me?”

He can’t think of anyone who ever did anything like that for him. Baekhyun gave him that calendar and comforted him when the voices and his own uselessness wore him down, but nothing like moving. Changing homes just to be with him.

Jongdae chuckles, gives a playful shrug. “I wouldn’t say _just _because of you, because I do have other friends and a job and a life here. But you were pretty much the deciding factor.”

Chanyeol can’t stop the stupid smile that pulls at his lips or the giggly laughter that bubbles up from his throat. Not that he wants to. His face feels hot in joy and embarrassment, but he doesn’t care. Jongdae stayed for him. Jongdae _stayed_ for _him. _Chanyeol can feel energy building up in his body, making him want to leap to his feet and run circles around the forest. He doesn’t know what the energy is, couldn’t name it even if he tried, but he likes how it feels vibrating under his skin.

He thinks it feels a little like Jongdae.

Jongdae watches him in silence for a moment, still smiling that soft, playful smile. Chanyeol smiles back.

And then he startles as the human crawls all the way across the barrier and settles on his knees. Jongdae pushes himself into Chanyeol’s space, so close Chanyeol can feel his breath fan across his face. Tension pulls Chanyeol’s body taut. No human has ever gotten into his space like this, no one but Jongdae on the night they met. Jongdae brings one hand up and cups Chanyeol’s cheek, tilts his head just so. “I’ve been thinking about doing this for a while. Push me away if you don’t like it.”

He leans in ever closer, Chanyeol’s mind spinning at the possibilities, at the way Jongdae’s eyes dart down to Chanyeol’s lips before slipping shut, and presses their lips together.

Chanyeol grabs Jongdae’s wrist in surprise. Jongdae’s lips are soft and warm against his own. A kiss. Baekhyun had mentioned kisses once, touching his fingertips to his lips and smiling up at the moon. He’d said they were the best things in the world. A rush unlike anything else he’d ever experienced, the tingles in his spine, the way all his thoughts would just fizzle out into nothingness, just fuzz and comfortable emptiness.

Chanyeol feels it all – and _more_. His spine tingles, electric fire shooting down to the tips of fingers and toes. It focuses on where he’s pressed against Jongdae, his cheek, his lips. His eyelids flutter shut on their own at the sensation. And his thoughts are all gone, swept away under the all-consuming tide of Jongdae.

All he knows is Jongdae. His smell, his sounds, his touch. Chanyeol’s world is narrowed to the way his lips feel pressed so sweetly against his own.

He isn’t sure how his world has ever been anything else _but _this.

When Jongdae begins to pull back, Chanyeol tightens his grip on Jongdae’s wrist, scared he’ll pull away completely. But Jongdae doesn’t go far, just enough space between them to breathe. Jongdae is still smiling, the beginnings of a smirk forming at the edges of his mouth. His lips that Chanyeol wants to feel again.

“Do you know what that was,” he asks.

Chanyeol nods and wonders what Jongdae would do if he didn’t. Chanyeol licks his lips and smiles. He’d probably pull away, end the moment, and explain exactly what just happened, explain what a kiss is and what it can mean, what Jongdae wants it to mean, if anything. Humans can kiss without meaning; Chanyeol’s heard some humans talk about things like while they stumbled around in the dark, drinking from bottles that smelled like poison. Chanyeol hopes Jongdae wants it to mean something.

“C-can,” Chanyeol’s eyes dart around Jongdae’s face. His pretty face, pretty eyes, pretty mouth, everything about his so damn _pretty_. Chanyeol’s lips tingle and Jongdae is so pretty and he _wants_. He doesn’t know what he wants, but he wants it all the same. “Can we do that again?”

He thinks Jongdae will give it to him anyway.

“We can do it as many times as you like,” Jongdae murmurs, and uses the hand cupping Chanyeol’s cheek to pull him in again.

~~*~~

Chanyeol learns time. He learns how to tell it, how to name the days that pass and put them together into weeks into months. Jongdae gives him a new calendar to mark time on. It’s covered in superheroes and has a special day marked in the month called September that’s just for Jongdae. His birthday.

It passed without Chanyeol knowing, Jongdae only bringing him the calendar at the start of the month called October after his birthday passed without Chanyeol’s well-wishes and he realized will-o-wisps don’t _have _birthdays or months. It had been a joke. That Chanyeol doesn’t even get his own birthday so why should he celebrate Jongdae’s. The human doesn’t blame him.

But Chanyeol blames himself. He wants a birthday, wants to mark his creation and celebrate it with Jongdae, but he can’t have one, so he wants to celebrate Jongdae’s to the fullest extent. All of October is spent scouring the forest for the perfect flowers and weaving them together into the perfect flower crown.

Jongdae laughs Chanyeol puts it on his head as a late birthday gift, asks if this means he’s a prince now. Chanyeol isn’t sure what a prince is, but he nods anyway. If Jongdae wants to be a prince, then a prince he shall be.

All he knows it that Jongdae looks elegant like this, bright flowers contrasting with his dark hair. The orange, reds, and yellows of autumn surrounding them on Chanyeol’s side of the barrier, so different than the deep greens of summer, and Chanyeol realizes how much time he has spent with Jongdae, a season coming and going in his company.

Jongdae thanks him, “This is one of the best birthday presents I’ve ever received, Yeollie. Definitely the best one this year.”

Chanyeol grins. “Next year’s will be better,” he promises. And he plans to be here for next year’s birthday, wants to laze away the seasons, warmed in the winter by Jongdae’s smile, cooled in the summer by his laugh. He wants to give the best presents for _every _year from now on.

Days dutifully marked off on his calendar. Jongdae says they met in June, a day before the longest day of the year. Chanyeol knows it by a name he can’t pronounce, can only understand in the deep, visceral way Jongdae understands the joy of seeing the sun after a storm.

Knowing everything will be alright now.

The longest day of the year is the shortest night and the end of moon’s decline, and while will-o-wisps are just as strong in sunlight as they are in the dark, Yixing always says that there is something simply incredible about the longest day of the year. Creatures of moonlight rejoicing the ascent of the moon’s power.

Jongdae says they met in June, kissed for the first time in August; it’s November now. Nearly half a year of nights.

Chanyeol wants a million more.

“It’s getting colder out,” Jongdae says. He leans into Chanyeol’s side, wrapped in blankets. He starts bringing extras as soon as the temperature started to drop. He forces them onto Chanyeol even though will-o-wisps don’t feel the cold because he doesn’t care, he wants to make sure Chanyeol is warm. Chanyeol’s pretty sure he would force Chanyeol into his sweaters too if they weren’t too small for him.

He nods. Brown leaves crackle underneath his body as he shifts to get more comfortable, back pressed against the barrier to keep himself propped up. “Winter is coming soon.” He can feel it in the air. It’s going to be a fierce winter, coming early and leaving late, bringing biting cold and deep snow. Things that are too dangerous for a human to brave without good reason. “Will you keep coming to see me?”

Jongdae doesn’t answer him for a time. He fidgets and sighs, fingers twitching where they’re held in Chanyeol’s own. Chanyeol gets a sinking feeling in his stomach and tries not to slump or show his sadness.

“It’s okay if you don’t,” he says. “Winter isn’t a good time for humans to be out. Nights are even colder than days. You could get sick.” He doesn’t know why he says it; Jongdae knows the dangers of winter better than Chanyeol ever will.

“I want you to come with me. To my home. You could spend all winter reading my comic books, and I wouldn’t have to worry about getting sick.”

Chanyeol looks at Jongdae in confusion and raps his knuckles against the barrier. “I can’t go with you. I can’t leave the forest.”

And Jongdae’s eyes flash with something like guilt as he looks away from Chanyeol’s face, out into the night. He squeezes Chanyeol’s hand in his own and leans more heavily against his side, stretches his body upwards to brush his lips against Chanyeol’s cheek. “You can, I think. I’ve read about it. I think there’s a way you could leave, but…”

“But what?” Not that Chanyeol is really that concerned about the end of Jongdae’s sentence. The idea of leaving the forest, being free of barriers, is tempting. The idea of getting to live with Jongdae even more so.

Chanyeol would see him every single day throughout the winter without worrying about Jongdae getting too cold or getting sick. They could kiss as much as they want, watch the movies Jongdae wants to show him but doesn’t have on DVD. Chanyeol could learn to read more than just comic books. Learn more about human life than just the bits and pieces he has now.

He could _be _with Jongdae the way he’s dreamt of, no being left behind anymore, for an entire _season_. Maybe more, depending on if Jongdae would let him stay through spring. There’s nothing that could make him pass that up.

Jongdae sucks in a deep breath and lets it out in a sigh. “But you wouldn’t be able to come back. You’d have to become human to cross the barrier, and that change would be permanent.”

“H-human?”

Jongdae’s voice softens as Chanyeol stiffens, “I know that’s a lot to ask of you, Chanyeol. But I wouldn’t do it if I didn’t think that you could be happier outside of the forest – not just with me, but as a human. You could be your own person, Chanyeol, do whatever you want without voices telling you you’re useless all the time.”

Chanyeol had always thought that he’d be angry if someone tried to convince him to leave this immortal, peaceful life behind for the temporary, chaotic life of a human. Not that he ever could, but he thought that the mere suggestion would make him mad.

Instead, he looks at the stars in Jongdae’s eyes, watches them twinkle with life that Chanyeol has never really understood, and feels undeniable fear. The life Jongdae suggests, paints with soft, urging words in a gentle voice, is tempting. It’s something that that he can almost imagine, almost _want_. And that’s scarier than anything Chanyeol has ever experienced.

“Can I think about it?” Jongdae’s eyebrows lift and his eyes brighten. Chanyeol bites at his lower lip and shifts down until he can rest his head against the human’s shoulder. “That’s – it’s – I’ve never imagined any sort of life outside of this one.”

“Of course,” Jongdae smiles, “Of course, you can think about it. You don’t owe me an answer any time soon. It can wait until next year, or the year after that, or the year after that. And I’m not going to leave you if you decide you don’t want to change. I like you just like this; nothing’s going to change that.”

Chanyeol curls into Jongdae’s side. Calm drips down his spine as warmth fills him from the inside out. He’s comfortable, secure and safe.

And if he imagines how nice it would be to be pressed against Jongdae like this inside a house, in a bed or a couch or even on the floor, tucked beneath blankets in warm clothing because the cold makes him shiver, his head empty of voices that don’t belong, Chanyeol decides it’s no one’s business but his own.

Time passes in quiet puffs of breath, blanket fabric sliding over skin and trapping in heat. The temperature drops lower the higher the moon rises, and soon Jongdae is digging another blanket out of his bag and throwing it over them both. “Can’t have you catching a cold,” he jokes, “You’d probably be the worst sick person to take care of. So dramatic and needy.”

“Would you still take care of me? Even if I was dramatic and needy,” Chanyeol asks, voice small.

Jongdae smiles and cranes his neck to kiss the shell of Chanyeol’s ear. Chanyeol’s eyes flutter shut and he hears Jongdae chuckle to himself. “Without complaint.”

“I’d do the same for you.” Chanyeol would. He doesn’t have even the beginnings of an idea of how to take care of a sick person, but he would learn for Jongdae. He would do whatever Jongdae asked of him with a smile, happy so long as the human recovered.

He would do anything to keep Jongdae well.

“Chanyeol,” a voice purrs. Chanyeol feels his entire body stiffen as his eyes fly open. He knows that voice, hears it in his head, pulling apart each minor mistake and spitting venomous words with a pretty, lilting accent.

Yixing steps out from the shadows, dark eyes fixed on Jongdae. “I wondered where you wandered off to, Chanyeol,” his voice pitches up in fake concern, false fear. His face slips into youth, eyes growing bigger as his face fills with baby fat. “Did you find someone to help us? We got lost after playing in the forest and can’t find our way back home. Can you help us?”

Jongdae stiffens in a mirror image of Chanyeol. “Who the fuck are you?”

Chanyeol knows how this will go. Jongdae won’t believe Yixing, because he knows Chanyeol is certainly not lost. And then Yixing will call up on his shadows – _solid _shadows because he’s the strongest will-o-wisp Chanyeol’s ever met and can turn the most basic of his illusions into reality. He’ll use those shadows to herd Jongdae to the lake whether he wants to go or not.

Jongdae will go to the lake, see the lights, and slip under the surface. Chanyeol will have to watch it happen. He’ll spend the rest of his days with Yixing’s voice in his ears, reminding him of the night Jongdae died.

Chanyeol can’t let that happen. The fear of it chills him to his very core, makes him feel sick in a way he’s never experienced before. Will-o-wisps aren’t supposed to feel fear. It’s a human emotion, warns them away from pain and danger, keeps them safe.

Chanyeol’s fear is going to keep Jongdae safe. Even if it means Chanyeol never sees him again, it’ll keep him safe.

“Go home, Jongdae! Go home and don’t come back!” He shoves the human back through the barrier where Yixing and his shadows can’t reach, throws the nearest heavy rock at Yixing’s face as a distraction, and _runs_.

Chanyeol crashes through the underbrush. Twigs scratch his face, rocks sending waves of pain up his legs as he steps on them. He doesn’t care. He just wants to get away. Jongdae calls after him, tells him to slow down. He can’t though, he _can’t_. Yixing is calling after Jongdae, saying that he’s lost and needs the human’s help.

He takes turns at random, eyes trained on the forest floor. He keeps yelling for Jongdae to leave, hopes that Yixing will chase after Chanyeol instead and punish him for helping a human. He’s never heard of a will-o-wisp hurting another will-o-wisp before, but he’s fine with being the first if it’s for Jongdae. He doesn’t care what happens to him, what damage his body has to endure, so long as Yixing never gets Jongdae. Never forces him to see the lake and the lights and _death_.

Footsteps follow his own. “Chanyeol,” Jongdae calls, “Chanyeol, come back! We already lost the guy!” Chanyeol keeps running, puts on an extra burst of speed in hopes that Jongdae will give up and escape before Yixing comes back.

“Goddammit! At least fucking slow down!”

Chanyeol’s eyes never leave the ground. Not when his legs ache from strain in a way they never have before, not even when something in the back of his mind, the part of him that tells him which way to go when he’s trying to lure a human, screams at him to stop and turn the other way. Not even when Jongdae’s footsteps are right behind his own, the human swearing.

Jongdae is catching up, curling a hand around Chanyeol’s arm, just as they break through a copse of trees into clear, unimpeded moonlight.

Chanyeol breaks through the trees and sees the moonlight, feels his feet hit sand, smells water. He skids to stop and finally looks up from his feet to see the lake stretching out in front of him, the moon reflecting off the water.

“No,” he whispers, “Please no.”

The voices rejoice in his ears. They laugh and cheer about how he has _finally _managed to find the lake. They tell him to be happy and celebrate.

The voice in the back of his head, the one that’s always made him say the wrong thing to humans, tip his hand and show that he’s not someone to be trusted, told him to turn left when he knows he should go right. It cries, asks him why, on tonight of all nights, with this human of all humans, he didn’t listen.

Chanyeol has finally found the lake, finally fulfilled his purpose. And he wishes more than anything that he hadn’t.

The sand and dirt are soft under his feet and between his toes. The moonlight is beautiful even as it mocks him from where it reflects off the deep, dark water. Above the water, shining like beacons, horrific and ugly unlike anything else Chanyeol has ever seen, are the lights – _the lights_.

The grip on Chanyeol’s arm goes slack as he turns around, eyes wide and frantic. “Jongdae, close your eyes! Don’t look!”

But Jongdae’s eyes are flat. His mouth has dropped open. The human steps away from Chanyeol with stiff legs and walks onwards toward the water, fixated on the lights. Chanyeol freezes in horror and tries to remember, in a hysterical, fleeting moment, if this is how Baekhyun looked that night, if this is how he felt.

Jongdae slips into the water with a soft, barely-there noise, and Chanyeol’s heart shatters.

“You did well,” Yixing says as he joins Chanyeol on the shore, tone bored and detached even as Chanyeol falls to his knees and starts to shake. Eyes fixed on the person splashing through the water. “I didn’t think that this tactic of yours would work – long-term manipulation seemed a little too complex for you. But I guess I was wrong.” And then he’s floating, body curling inwards as he glows from the inside out, turning into a little ball of light that rises until it joins the others above the lake.

Chanyeol can feel his body want to follow, gut turning light like butterfly wings. “It wasn’t a tactic,” he whispers, “I didn’t mean to do this.” He didn’t mean to lead Jongdae here.

Jongdae swims toward the center of the lake, eyes likely just as glazed and empty as they were when they first saw the floating lights. He’ll swim and swim, forever trying to reach the lights hovering just out of his reach, until his body gets too tired and he drops below the waves. He’ll join the bodies at the bottom just as Chanyeol joins the other will-o-wisps above.

Chanyeol tries to tell himself that the humans do it to themselves. They’re the ones who swim out into the lake until they can’t swim any longer. He tries to tell himself that it won’t be his fault when he finally floats up above the lake just as the human sinks down. He tries to tell himself it won’t be his fault when Jongdae drowns.

And then he curls in on himself and cries because _Jongdae will drown_.

He thinks of Baekhyun that night, standing on the shore as the human he’d been spending so much time with swam out to his death. He’d come with a bag full of clothes and planned to ask Baekhyun to leave with him. That’s what Chanyeol heard him saying to himself as he walked to the lake that night, repeating his speech over and over until it was perfect.

He never got the chance to use it, eyes landing on the lights the moment he stepped out from the trees.

Baekhyun had stood on the shore, eyes trained on the figure in the water, fists clenched so tightly his knuckles turned white, tears rolling down his cheeks. He took a few deep breaths. Then he smiled, fists uncurling.

_I can’t lose him._

Chanyeol thinks of how Baekhyun looked as he threw himself into the water, screaming the human’s name as he swam. He didn’t know how to swim, none of the will-o-wisps did, but he swam as hard as he could. He reached the human before he’d made it to the middle of the lake, and then went under. The human dove under a few seconds later, turned away from the lights and screamed Baekhyun’s name.

They weren’t under for long, but Chanyeol saw a ball of light float up from where they had sunk. It shot up into the sky, higher than any will-o-wisp had ever gone, and burst into a million different beams.

Baekhyun and the human surfaced a few seconds later, gasping for air. _Alive_.

Chanyeol thinks of how happy Jongdae makes him, how it felt when Jongdae pressed their lips together and told Chanyeol he’s beautiful - how he’s always _enough_. No terms, no conditions, nothing about him that needed to change. To Jongdae, Chanyeol has always been enough just as he is.

They have spent nearly half a year of nights together, nearly half of those nights spent learning about things Chanyeol had only ever heard in whispers on the wind. Care, trust, acceptance, tenderness, _love_. Monsters don’t love, and so Chanyeol cannot be a monster.

The voices are loud in his ears. They’re not mocking anymore, not outright, but they’re not kind. They’re not accepting, and they never will be. To the other will-o-wisps, it doesn’t matter what he does, he’ll _never _be enough. Because Chanyeol isn’t a good will-o-wisp; it’s fine, because he doesn’t want to be, not anymore.

He has found something so much greater than this, and he intends to keep it.

Jongdae splashes in the water, nearly at the center of the lake. And Chanyeol whispers, feels tears well up in his eyes as he realizes exactly where he belongs, “I can’t lose you.”

The pull to float grows stronger with every passing second, and Chanyeol gives in, lets himself be lifted off the ground. His body wants to curl into a ball, disappear into light and emptiness. He forces himself to stay whole, stay _human_, as he’s carried towards the center of the lake. To Jongdae.

When he’s just behind Jongdae, the human treading water and staring up at the lights with those heartbreakingly flat eyes, Chanyeol squeezes his eyes shut and tries to pull away. His head feels light, ears filled with the sound of rushing water. The moonlight feels almost as though it’s glowing brighter. It shines down on him so intensely that it nearly burns – some unidentifiable, intangible link pulling tighter and tighter. A hand trying to drag him into an abyss that will never let him back out again.

Chanyeol thinks of Jongdae, of the way a book feels in his hand, of the way Jongdae’s smile feels under his lips. He thinks of a house with a bed that he’d like to share with Jongdae someday. He fills his head with Jongdae until there’s no room for anything else. Not the moon, not the lake, not the way his entire world is fraying apart at the seams with each passing second.

He fills himself with _human_, and then, with a _pop _and a _splash_, Chanyeol falls into the lake.

The water is _freezing_, so cold it makes Chanyeol’s muscles lock up. He already knew he wouldn’t be able to swim for long, but shock makes it impossible to swim at all. The soaked fabric of Jongdae’s shirt catches in his outstretched fingers, gripped so tightly Chanyeol’s knuckles go white. When Chanyeol goes under, limbs frozen and helpless against the cold water and the weight of his own body, Jongdae goes too.

Water rushes up Chanyeol’s nose and into his mouth, stings his eyes. Not that he can see anything in the pitch-black water. Chanyeol’s chest burns from the lack of air. Fear and self-preservation instincts that he’s never had before jolt his body into action; he kicks his legs and flails his arms, but he flipped and turned as he went under and isn’t sure which way is up.

Panic surges through his veins. Scared for himself and then for Jongdae. He wonders if Jongdae woke up when he went under, or if the man is sinking to the bottom, his need to live suppressed by the lights. Chanyeol reaches out for Jongdae and finds nothing but water.

He calls out before he can stop himself and feels the last of his air leave him in little bubbles. There’s no air – _there’s no air!_ Chanyeol sucks in water. The world greys at the edges and he sinks down, lower and lower.

Arms fit around his chest and pull. Everything is strange underwater, floating and sinking all at once, but Chanyeol can feel himself being yanked upwards, pressed against another body.

Water rushes past his ears, brain jerking and spitting inside his head as his body screams for oxygen, and then he breaks the surface. One arm stays wrapped around him as a fist starts beating between his shoulder blades. It hurts. He tries to twist away from it, but he’s held fast. “Cough! You have to cough, Chanyeol! You have to get the water out of your lungs!”

Chanyeol tries to whine and push his way free, but he’s too weak to lift his arms and his whine stops in his throat. It sticks there for a moment, pressure building in his chest.

The whine finally comes out as a cough, and then he can’t stop coughing. Water spews out of his mouth and _burns_. His chest, his throat, his mouth and nose, they all burn as more and more water is pushed out of his lungs. Burns as he sucks in air. His eyes flutter open and he sees Jongdae, eyes wide in terror before his face relaxes. “There you go,” he smiles, “Cough it all up. I’ve got you.”

Chanyeol’s searches above Jongdae’s head for the lights and tries to heave in enough air to speak when he realizes they’re behind him instead, reflecting in Jongdae’s eyes. “D-d-don’t look…don’t look at th-the lights!”

He flails an arm up to cover Jongdae’s eyes before he’s sucked under their spell again, but the man just dodges and shushes him. “I won’t. I won’t. I _promise_ I won’t. I’ve only got eyes for you. I’ve always only been looking at you.” Jongdae keeps his eyes on Chanyeol’s as he leans back and starts to pull the two of them towards the shore. “Don’t worry about me, Yeollie, just focus on breathing. If you can kick your legs a little and help me get us out of the lake though, that’d be great.”

Chanyeol tries, but the cold and the shock have worn him out. “I’m tired,” he whispers and starts to shiver, “and cold.”

“I know. But we have to get out of the forest, or we’ll die of hypothermia.”

The shore is close now and Chanyeol can nearly touch the bottom of the lake. “Can we rest on the shore?”

Jongdae shakes his head, face uncomfortably serious. “Not even for a second. We’re going to be in even more danger outside of the water. I don’t care how cold you are, you don’t stop until you’re in my car. Do you understand me, Chanyeol? Do _not _stop walking until you’re in the car.”

“But I can’t get to your car,” Chanyeol whines, “The barrier will stop me…” Another shiver works its way down his spine. He has a flash of Baekhyun and blue lips. “Or…or maybe it won’t. Will-o-wisps don’t get cold.”

“No,” Jongdae agrees, “no they don’t.”

Chanyeol doesn’t know what to think about that.

They climb out of the water and Chanyeol understands what Jongdae meant when he said they’d be in even more danger outside of the water. The water was frigid, but the air is _freezing_, so cold it knocks Chanyeol flat on his ass, knocks all the thoughts out of his head except for how cold he is. Jongdae hauls him back to his feet and forces him to walk through the forest, pulling him along even when he begs for a moment to rest.

Jongdae guides them to the edge of the forest, where his bag is still lying on the ground. He scoops it up without breaking stride or letting go of Chanyeol’s arm. Chanyeol is shivering so hard he can barely move, wouldn’t be able to if it wasn’t for Jongdae pulling him along.

He can’t even see the barrier now, passes the edge of the tree root that had always marked the end of his territory without noticing. Only looks back when Jongdae digs a ring of keys out from his bag and the thing he calls his car lights up with a _beep_. Chanyeol’s heart beats steadily in his chest, muscles jumping under his skin to try and keep him warm. His stomach growls.

He is human.

Jongdae finally lets Chanyeol go to open up the machine and bring out towels. He throws one over each shoulder and turns to Chanyeol, “Clothes off, they’ll just keep you cold.”

Chanyeol’s wet clothes hit the ground with a squishing, smacking sound. Jongdae takes one of the towels and starts rubbing him down, heat building at the friction. “Need to get you to stop shivering. Kyungsoo said you’d be running on empty, need to conserve as much energy as possible.”

A big hoodie is tugged over Chanyeol’s head, sweatpants up his legs, and he isn’t so cold anymore. Jongdae is still shivering, lips blue from the cold. Chanyeol reaches for the other towel. “D-do you n-need help, J-Jongdae? I-I can -”

Jongdae shakes his head and strips off his own clothes. Chanyeol follows their descent to the ground, where they land next to – nothing. They land next to nothing. Chanyeol doesn’t know why he thought they’d land next to anything. He looks back to the forest, to the trees standing tall and quiet as a barrier, keeping the forest in. The forest, and something else. He doesn’t remember what it is.

He looks back and Jongdae is dressed again, pulling blankets out of his bag and wrapping one around himself before tossing the other to Chanyeol. Chanyeol catches it, wraps it around his own shoulders, and shuffles into Jongdae’s space.

Jongdae laughs, “In the car, Chanyeol.” But then he cups Chanyeol’s cheek and pulls him down for a kiss, lips starting to warm up again now that he’s wrapped up in thick fabric. Chanyeol sighs into the kiss, content that this is exactly where he should be, moonlight shining down, filtered through wispy clouds.

“I like you,” Chanyeol whispers, “I like you a lot.”

“Good thing for me, huh? Because I like you too.” Chanyeol smiles. Jongdae calls him cute and gives him one more kiss.

Before Chanyeol gets into the front seat of the car, hot air already blowing through special holes called “vents”, he looks back at the forest one last time. There’s a person standing at the edge of the forest, watching him.

Chanyeol thinks he should remember who the person is, but he doesn’t. Something tells him he doesn’t want to remember anyway.

Jongdae drives them away. Away from the forest and person. The lake and the lights above it. Chanyeol curls up in his seat and smiles at the warm air blowing in his face, luring him to sleep. He feels nice, warm, happy, head empty of anything else but this moment. Like he’s floating on waves of peace and quiet.

“You okay,” Jongdae asks. He reaches across the front seat and takes one of Chanyeol’s hands in his own, thumb warm as it rubs across his skin. Chanyeol nods with a hum, eyes slipping shut. “Good, good, I’m glad. You can sleep now, if you want. I’ll wake you up when we get home.”

Chanyeol starts to drift.

The forest disappears in the distance.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! If you liked it, please leave a kudos and a comment! You can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/killmeDO) and [Curious Cat](https://curiouscat.me/killmeDO) Sometimes I talk about what I'm working on next and post snippets! I'd love to hear from you <3


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